Modern technology has utilized cocking mechanisms for air rifles wherein a lever mounted to the rifle moves a piston against a spring such that a volume of air is drawn into an associated cylinder and rapidly released by the spring forcing a piston within the cylinder to return. The nature of the spring is variable and maybe a coil spring, a gas spring, an air strut, or any other variation used to bias the piston in position to compress the volume of air necessary to fire the projectile. Depending on the type projectile fired by the air rifle, the projectile may be introduced one at a time into the breach of an air rifle that opens to receive the projectile while compressing the spring or by a feeder magazine.